Copying Beethoven doesn't shed light on those torments, partly because the screenwriters keep a respectful distance from their subject and partly because Holland is too smart and unsentimental to fall into such a storybook trap. Beethoven's nephew Karl (Joe Anderson) expresses revulsion at his uncle's affection for him. But, happily, no one delivers a speech about the psychological undergirding of a relationship that would, finally, be known only to these long-dead men. When Beethoven talks about Karl, Harris releases his scowl as if unclenching a fist; you don't need to hear the composer describe his love and pain, you see them. Kruger, alas, must explain more, largely because of her gender, which needs both contextual explanation and, apparently, a love interest.
According to Rivele, the character of Anna Holtz, though based on two of Beethoven's male copyists, was created in part because the intimation of a love story helped finance the production. That seems plausible. Certainly a film about an irritable male genius and his male assistants might not be as entrancing as the image of Kruger scrubbing a floor on her hands and knees, skirt pushed up to reveal a sliver of luminous skin. This isn't a criticism: Kruger looks exceedingly fetching whether on the floor or hunched over a desk. More to the point, her attractiveness is not irrelevant in a film with such an unembarrassed feeling for beauty, be it in a woman's face or a rapturous ode to joy.
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